London's Pulse: Medical Officer of Health reports 1848-1972

View report page

Dagenham 1932

[Report of the Medical Officer of Health for Dagenham]

This page requires JavaScript

63
There were 368 families possessing one to six susceptibles in
which all the susceptibles succumbed ; ignoring the case of the
only child, there were 253 families with 635 children who all contracted
measles. There were 208 families, in whom the number
of susceptibles varied from one to five, in which all those who had
not previously suffered an attack succumbed, the total number of
children affected being 431. Exclusion of those cases where there
was only one susceptible child leaves 105 families with 328 children.

Combined, these figures read that in 358 families, when measles was introduced by one member, it spread to all the remainingnon-immunemembers, namely 963 children.

No. of families in which all children succumbed115149791681
No. of families in which all susceptibles succumbed103643362
No. of children in family who succumbed this time123456

Against these cases demonstrating the infectivity without
production of immunity are the following, in which children,
apparently susceptible, did not develop the disease. The number
of those not attacked this time after exposure to an illness alleged
to be measles was 135, of whom 53 were infants under nine months
of age. The number of children who suffered this time from an
alleged attack of measles after being supposed to have been previously
exposed was 51. An analysis of these cases which might
be interpreted as being cases of measles occurring to-day in children
who had been temporarily immunised by a previous exposure,
shows that:—
(1) In some cases the child suffering to-day was alleged to have
had a previous attack of measles. In most instances the presumption
is warranted that one or other of these attacks was not measles.
(2) The condition to which the child was previously exposed
was, in many instances, probablv not measles. Out of the 51 cases,
in 37 instances the previous case occurring in the house was the
only child to go down with measles, although there were other
susceptibles in the home. In the case of the remaining 14, two
children were attacked at the same time in 11 instances and three
in 3. Hut of these children who were not attacked when what was
apparently measles was present in the home, 3 were under one year
of age and another 4 were one year old.